Picking up those brushes again.

Hi and welcome to the occasional mutterings of Dave Doc, a military modeller and some time gamer. Gaming and model making has given me a real education, History & Geography(obvious really), Artistry, Politics, Economics, Logistics, Project Management -you try building miniature armies without the last 3.

I will use the blog to record my creations & the odd occasion I actually do some gaming.

I have always been inspired by the aesthetic side of gaming. Playing on well constructed terrain using excellently painted units is always a joy.

Monday, 13 June 2016

A weekend of Sudan gaming (pic heavy)

This last weekend saw a gathering of gamers from the AMG forum all organised by Graham from Crann Tara Miniatures. The meet up was at the Chesford Grange Hotel in Kenilworth where we would have a private function room for the weekend, and be plied with food and drinks.

I have been using this event deadline to help me push on with the Sudan items which has really helped to move things along.

Over the course of the weekend I ran 4 games for 15 people. All went very well , with some almost nail biting action . The Imperial forces were tasked with relieving the Egyptian Garrison - and of course rescuing the Generals wife and daughter - who just happen to be trapped in the village too. 16 turns were set as the target before the garrison would surrender.

Is that the relief column in the distance? They seem a long way off...

The scene is set ...the lead scouts are on the table , now where are the Mahdists hiding ?

19th Hussars - chasing off Mahdist camels.

Mahdist marksman start to take pot shots at the village - heads down lads.

The first Mahdist assault heads for the North side of the village. Rapid fire time lads!

Now where did they get hold of a Gatling gun! The Mahdists threw the best result they could possible do to unseat a large number of hussars before they were cut down! ouch...

The camel corps dismount and give the Mahdists a volley! - see em off!

Its the Mahdi! and a whole howling mob in support!

At this the garrison having seen off an assault from the other side , decided that column was taking long - and being down to the last few rounds decided to break out and head up table.

The generals wife and daughter had mounted thier camels and sped off across the sands leaving the Egyptian in thier wake

They was soon being escorted to safety by a squadron of Bengal Lancers.

Overall this is an amalgam of 4 games over the weekend - all were very close - with the results swung by one or two dice rolls , or the turn of a card. The look on the Hussar commanders face when the Gatling dropped half his squadron with the best possible roll they could make - priceless.

I had changed the ambush rules - and these are now fully card driven - with two blank cards to one ambush card in the deck - plus a few other random events as well. It worked well. One game turned up mahdsists at every piece of terrain at the beginning - which really slowed them - another made rapid progress as no mahdists were uncovered until half way across the table - but in both the paranoia was enough! Game 3 - Aly Morrison could not hit a barn door with the Egyptians.. they fell to a man... but the ladies escaped - just! And the decision making of do they chase off the "caravan" who only
wanted to sell a few pieces of fruit , - or dirty postcards - but who are
slowing the column down , but if you do it might annoy the natives (it did 600 appeared! )- great fun.

I decided to run charges as simultaneous,not i go u go, that worked well. I allowed a foot unit adjacent to the water carrier to do double move march - at expense of using water - but with a caveat of if it ran out the column would suffer heat casualties (of course just when it might run out was only known by me,,,) Some gambled - some did not.

The games were all played in a great spirit with much ribbing of the column commanders by the besieged garrison!

Dave,A really nice write up for what looked like a terrific game. Well done sir. Shame I never got a chance to play (but probably just as well because the temptation to collect figures would have been great). Cheers.

Wonderful collection of photographs Dave and great to see your own tweaks worked very well for the games you piut on. It is very, very satisfying to see so many people enjoying the rules and playing the game. Thanks do much for the correspondence as well.